Stars of Fortune (The Guardians Trilogy 1)

He collapsed on her, stripped raw, his heart pounding, his mind still whirling in the dark.

Then her arms came around him.

His mind began to clear as did the shadows that haunted the room.

He cursed himself, viciously, but struggled to keep his voice easy as he lifted his head. “I hurt you. I— Ah, God.”

Her eyes swam with tears as they stared into his.

“I had no right.” He started to push away, but her arms tightened around him.

“You didn’t hurt me. I’m not crying—or not like that. I didn’t know . . . I never knew anyone could want me like that. That it was possible to want like that. I didn’t think it was duty, Bran, but maybe I did think, at least a little, that part of it—of this—was convenience. I don’t think that now.”

He laid his forehead on hers. “You weren’t breathing. Things had to be done—that’s duty—but all the while, from that moment when I put my hand on your heart and you had no breath to this moment all I could think was I’d lost you. For duty. For a promise made before either of us existed.

“And everything stopped until you breathed again. And the time between your breaths, fáidh, was an eon.” He touched his lips to her brow, shifted away. “Since this . . . duty came to be mine, I’ve known little fear. It’s been a challenge, a mission, a purpose. And now there’s fear, that you could be hurt beyond my power to heal.”

“It’s my purpose, too.” She sat up with him. “And I’m afraid something will happen to you. Doyle said I was the glue. Maybe that’s true, though I don’t think the glue’s as strong as it needs to be. But you’re the power—the source of it. We can’t do this without you. And I . . .”

“You said you were in love with me.”

“What?”

“Downstairs, when you were giving the others a good piece of your mind, you said you were in love with me.”

“I was raving.” To stall for time, for composure, she looked around for her clothes, found the ripped ruin of her shirt.

He took it from her, tossed it aside, then caught her hands in his. “Are you? You know feelings, Sasha. Is what you feel a spark, an attraction, a bit of heat and excitement? Or is it love, that holds and waits and opens?”

“I want it to be the first. So much easier for both of us.”

“But is it?”

She shut her eyes. “I’m so in love with you. I fell in love with you before I met you. In dreams, in drawings. Then there you were, and part of me just wanted to fall at your feet and beg.”

“You beg from no one.” He caught her face in his hands. “You beg for nothing.”

“I dreamed of you, and I’m here with you. And that’s so much more than I ever expected to have.”

“Woman, you can infuriate me. Would you settle for so little?”

“To take more than you’d ever expected isn’t settling.”

“Bollocks to that.” He grabbed her hand, pressed it to his heart. “Damned if it’s just words for you. Feel it. Feel what I feel. Know it. Don’t argue with me,” he said before she could. “I’ve opened to you. Now feel what I feel.”

She might have resisted, tried to block, but he pushed—and her own heart wanted so much to know. It flowed from him, into her. The love. Soft and generous, fierce and determined, powerful and weak. A vow as yet unspoken.

All she felt for him echoed back—him to her.

“You love me.” She let out a half laugh, lifted his hand to her heart. “You love me. You love me.”

“A phrase spoken three times is powerful magick. I suppose now I’ll have to. I love you—and now

you have the words as well. What I feel, what you know is only yours. No one before, and for always. Yours.

“The moment I saw you, I wanted. That’s the spark. And when I had you, I wanted only more. That’s the binding. But the love, and all it means, came in a dozen ways.”

“I need to . . .” She wrapped her arms around him, pressed her face to his shoulder as everything she felt, he felt, twined together inside her like braided rope. “Hold on. To you, to this, to this exact moment. Whenever I’m sad or afraid, I can bring it back, and be here.”